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I have to say that I did find The Ashen Man really cool plot seed :D
BTW, is Red Bishop really CN or is that typo? I'm really surprised if he is CN since he seems so obviously evil ._.
But yeah, I have read the whole book by now and really loving it, so onto writing the review
Damnit.
That's a typo. The Red Bishop is Chaotic Evil.
What would you say is the most common GM mistake/ thing to improve on?
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What would you say is the most common GM mistake/ thing to improve on?
Assuming that you already know everything there is to know about GMing. Every GM can improve, and the two best ways for a GM to improve, other than by running games, is to play a game as a player and to read a LOT. Particularly RPG books and adventures, but also any other books in the chosen genre—as well as playing games and watching movies in the same genre. Constantly immerse yourself in the creativity of others, in other words.
How much chance is there for a Jade Regent AP in the card game? I've really enjoyed the first four.
Which aliens did you create for Alien Archive 2, which is spectacular!
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Which aliens did you create for Alien Archive 2, which is spectacular!
I did the dinosaurs, the demon, the colour out of space, and the mi-go.
The demon's the only one I really "created" since the others were invented by evolution or Lovecraft. :-P
I found the Cthulhu Mythos by Sandy Petersen Games at one of our local game stores. The Dreamlands Cat is quite popular with my kids, as my wife is highly allergic so we can't have cats, so thanks! My question is, which adventure paths would you recommend for a party with a cat or two. Strange Aeons is the obvious choice but is there another one that stands out for you.
And a bonus question (feel free to only answer either one): How hard was it to design cats as a playable race.
At any rate, thanks for all your hard work and contributions to the hobby, they're greatly appreciated! I can't imagine where I'd be without them, thanks!
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I found the Cthulhu Mythos by Sandy Petersen Games at one of our local game stores. The Dreamlands Cat is quite popular with my kids, as my wife is highly allergic so we can't have cats, so thanks! My question is, which adventure paths would you recommend for a party with a cat or two. Strange Aeons is the obvious choice but is there another one that stands out for you.
And a bonus question (feel free to only answer either one): How hard was it to design cats as a playable race.
At any rate, thanks for all your hard work and contributions to the hobby, they're greatly appreciated! I can't imagine where I'd be without them, thanks!
PC cats are going to disrupt and transform the baseline experience of the game; I tried to provide advice and examples of how to handle that in the book, but be prepared for weirdness to ensue with certain class combos being either completely useless or vastly overpowered on a cat.
Beyond that, the whole concept of an intelligent cat is intrinsically much more fantasy themed than horror themed, and so a Dreamlands cat would work equally well in pretty much any Adventure Path, I think.
It wasn't hard to design them as a playable race. It was VERY hard designing them in a way that makes them "balanced" against other races for a game that takes the human shape and size as an underlying assumption.
Glad you like the book though! Have fun with the cats!
Mr. James Jacobs,
If Nocticula, as the Redeemer Queen, were to grant power to an Oracle which mysteries would she most likely grant?
Whcih would Brigh grant?
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Mr. James Jacobs,
If Nocticula, as the Redeemer Queen, were to grant power to an Oracle which mysteries would she most likely grant?
Whcih would Brigh grant?
Oracles don't work that way.
When you play an oracle, you, the player, get to pick the mystery. Whether or not you worship a deity or a group of them or not, and WHO you worship, is also left up to you, the player. If you choose a mystery that doesn't thematically match the deity or deities you claim to worship, the onus is on you, the player, to provide a logical and thematic reason why you're "weird."
Are there any ideas being bounced around about new classes for Second Edition that weren't in First? Obviously anything like this would be years off, if it ever gets to a book at all, but I was just curious of some interesting new ideas.
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Are there any ideas being bounced around about new classes for Second Edition that weren't in First? Obviously anything like this would be years off, if it ever gets to a book at all, but I was just curious of some interesting new ideas.
As with all 2nd edition questions... please file this one away in the "Remember to ask James this question later, once 2nd edition is out and it's appropriate to ask questions about that edition of the game." :-P
How should I pronounce Dtang Ma? I mean, should I pronounce both D and T?
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Why isn’t Cayden Cailean’s pet dog, Thunder, his Herald? Just throwing it out there, that if his dog post ascension is strong enough to sire an entire outsider race whose offspring with mortal dogs still have outsider levels of power, shouldn’t he be the obvious choice for Herald?
Nah. Doesn't fit his style.
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Most of the Adventure Paths seem to be being written into Golarion's history, but Jade Regent seems to be an exception (Sandpoint book is set before it happens; Return of the Runelords avoids the Rusty Dragon to avoid being committed to whether it's happened). Any particular reason?
"Most" in this case refers to "two": Shattered Star and Return of the Runelords. The others don't do this.
With the exception of the Runelords trilogy, and perhaps the relationship between Council of Thieves and Hell's Vengeance, the Adventure Paths aren't intended to go in any particular order, really.
At some point we'll probalby codify them though, in which case they'll roughly take place in order of their publication.
I posted this in another thread but I suppose I may as well here as well for visibility's sake:
I don't suppose I could ask you what might happen if, say, someone were to take the body of a Good-aligned Outsider and raise them up as an intelligent undead? At least in terms of personality, I mean, as from the Axiomite Graveknights listing in the SRD as well as the case of Arazni who I'm sure counted as some form of Outsider given her relationship to Aroden at the time before her death.
I only ask because my Necromancer character has taken to doing this with a lot of the enemy Outsiders we defeat in the Hell's Vengeance campaign we're running and any input you may have on what happens there mentally would be great. For instance, I've raised a Vulpinal Agathion as a Skeletal Champion, a Lillend Azata as a Zombie Lord, and most recently a Ghaele Azata as a Dullahan, all of which he has not controlled or compelled to do evil with any Control spells nor his Undead commanding feat. The last one is the most interesting to me since it's less of a template like the first two and more like a completely different creature type (and completely opposite on both the L/C and G/E spectrums to boot!), so any insight you may have would be welcome.
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Strange Aeons question: So to destroy Imperial Diadem, would Hastur have to die permanently, or would it be enough to defeat him and put him dormant? ._.
If its former, geez, this is probably the first artifact I've seen which's destruction clause is literally impossible (its fitting yeah, but they are usually possible in theory even if really unlikely :D)
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What level Summon Monster, for worshippers of Cayden Cailean, would be appropriate to allow Caypups, and later Cayhounds (and I mean actual Cayhounds, not Celestial Riding Dogs), to be summonable?
That's a rules question, but the do-it-yourself answer is to look at the CR of those creatures, match them to the CRs on existing monster summon lists and put them there.
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According to some pre-Mythic Adventures books, characters like Geb, Nex, Sorshen, Xanderghul and Xin were wizards with '20+' levels. Is that plus sign supposed to represent archmage tiers now?
It represents the fact that there's more to the character than 20 levels and a PC class. Some of them have mythic tiers. Some have templates. Some have ad-hoc unique bonuses that PCs can't get. Point is, it means that their CR is higher than 20 for whatever reason.
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I posted this in another thread but I suppose I may as well here as well for visibility's sake:
I don't suppose I could ask you what might happen if, say, someone were to take the body of a Good-aligned Outsider and raise them up as an intelligent undead? At least in terms of personality, I mean, as from the Axiomite Graveknights listing in the SRD as well as the case of Arazni who I'm sure counted as some form of Outsider given her relationship to Aroden at the time before her death.
I only ask because my Necromancer character has taken to doing this with a lot of the enemy Outsiders we defeat in the Hell's Vengeance campaign we're running and any input you may have on what happens there mentally would be great. For instance, I've raised a Vulpinal Agathion as a Skeletal Champion, a Lillend Azata as a Zombie Lord, and most recently a Ghaele Azata as a Dullahan, all of which he has not controlled or compelled to do evil with any Control spells nor his Undead commanding feat. The last one is the most interesting to me since it's less of a template like the first two and more like a completely different creature type (and completely opposite on both the L/C and G/E spectrums to boot!), so any insight you may have would be welcome.
Saw this posted there and answered there, but the short version is this: It's a rare thing that needs to be hand-crafted by the GM as the story desires.
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Strange Aeons question: So to destroy Imperial Diadem, would Hastur have to die permanently, or would it be enough to defeat him and put him dormant? ._.
If its former, geez, this is probably the first artifact I've seen which's destruction clause is literally impossible (its fitting yeah, but they are usually possible in theory even if really unlikely :D)
I'm not familiar with the Imperial Diadem, which tells me that it's something that was added to the mythology in writing/development of the Adventure Path, neither of which I was involved with. Sounds like it'd be tough to destroy the gizmo then, yeah.
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Ah oki, gonna avoid Strange Aeons spoilers then!
Speaking of impossible tasks, I'm wondering if players somehow lose ability to dream if that would protect them from Hastur sending nightmares to them? (which lest be honest, is probably main reason why Strange Aeons campaign's ending is gonna be dark even if instead of characters falling into hopelessness they take solace in delaying the inevitable. That said I'm sure they would be haunted even if they didn't have Great Old One sending them visions)
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Ah oki, gonna avoid Strange Aeons spoilers then!
Speaking of impossible tasks, I'm wondering if players somehow lose ability to dream if that would protect them from Hastur sending nightmares to them? (which lest be honest, is probably main reason why Strange Aeons campaign's ending is gonna be dark even if instead of characters falling into hopelessness they take solace in delaying the inevitable. That said I'm sure they would be haunted even if they didn't have Great Old One sending them visions)
I think that for someone who loses the ability to dream to STILL have dreams when Hastur or ANY Great Old One or Outer God sends them is pretty creepy.
Have you seen the Haunting of Hill House? It took me two days to finish but WOW!
Saw this posted there and answered there, but the short version is this: It's a rare thing that needs to be hand-crafted by the GM as the story desires.I posted this in another thread but I suppose I may as well here as well for visibility's sake:
I don't suppose I could ask you what might happen if, say, someone were to take the body of a Good-aligned Outsider and raise them up as an intelligent undead? At least in terms of personality, I mean, as from the Axiomite Graveknights listing in the SRD as well as the case of Arazni who I'm sure counted as some form of Outsider given her relationship to Aroden at the time before her death.
I only ask because my Necromancer character has taken to doing this with a lot of the enemy Outsiders we defeat in the Hell's Vengeance campaign we're running and any input you may have on what happens there mentally would be great. For instance, I've raised a Vulpinal Agathion as a Skeletal Champion, a Lillend Azata as a Zombie Lord, and most recently a Ghaele Azata as a Dullahan, all of which he has not controlled or compelled to do evil with any Control spells nor his Undead commanding feat. The last one is the most interesting to me since it's less of a template like the first two and more like a completely different creature type (and completely opposite on both the L/C and G/E spectrums to boot!), so any insight you may have would be welcome.
Your response in the other thread was fair, in my opinion my GM is doing a rather good job of making it clear that what I'm doing is unusual and not normally something that is done by those of my character's... craft, we'll call it. The fact that we're playing an Evil party also means that it's not the biggest deal in the world if the Outsiders themselves also become Evil-aligned since we are Evil as well (yaaay Vengeance!). The reason I asked was because while I'm completely fine with the idea of all undead (aside from Ghosts) automatically becoming Evil upon being raised, I was reminded of Arazni's lore where it seems that she needed further convincing to fully convert over to embracing Evil, so I just wanted to pick your brain on the matter to see if you thought the Raising itself were something that altered the character's perception of reality instantly or if it's just one of those things where a formerly Good-aligned undead thinks at first they can still be Good but then inherently darker desires as an undead eventually unleash themselves, I suppose in a manner similar to a slow-acting alignment-shifting curse.
Also, as a related but ultimately separate question I may as well ask what the exact implications are, spiritually speaking, that one can even raise Outsiders as undead given that their body IS their soul. I'm well aware of the fact that raising a mortal as an undead prevents them from facing Judgement by Pharasma and janks with the Cycle of Souls, but my friends and I have tried looking it up and we aren't quite sure what exactly happens to Outsiders when THEY die, since I'm pretty sure Pathfinder doesn't use the lore stating that killing Outsiders doesn't really "kill" them unless you do it on their home plane. Anyway, yeah, Lord help me if I can't find an answer to how this works in Pathfinder's lore anywhere in books or in any Q/A's, IS there an official answer to this, and if so did me and my buddies just miss it somewhere? Does raising an Outsider actually interact with the cycle at all?
Hi!
I was thinking about running a solo game of Council of Thieves with PF1 rules.
I am "new" to PF, what type of books should I use, if I am considering using an all good aligned, "divine focused" characters (paladin, cleric, divine sorcerer, monk hunter with a spiritual beast)?
Should I use the core rulebook only?
Should I use the Ultimate Campaign or other similar sourcebooks (I am not familiar with any of them)?
Which of the Queens of the Night would be most receptive to be a patron for a witch?
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What did you think of the new Halloween movie?
I've seen it twice so far and I love it. It's got a few pacing problems here and there, but the acting and score are outstanding. It made me kinda tear up to hear John Carpenter music on a movie for the first time in nearly 20 years, and Jamie Lee Curtis was amazing as well. I hope the movie's success is satisfying and gratifying to Carpenter, since he's had a long period of being ignored/abused by critics and producers and studios.
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Have you seen the Haunting of Hill House? It took me two days to finish but WOW!
I watched the entire series back-to-back on the day it released. It's brilliant. Staggeringly good. I had VERY high expectations, since Mike Flanagan's not yet directed a movie I didn't love, but this blew those expectations out of the water.
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Your response in the other thread was fair, in my opinion my GM is doing a rather good job of making it clear that what I'm doing is unusual and not normally something that is done by those of my character's... craft, we'll call it. The fact that we're playing an Evil party also means that it's not the biggest deal in the world if the Outsiders themselves also become Evil-aligned since we are Evil as well (yaaay Vengeance!). The reason I asked was because while I'm completely fine with the idea of all undead (aside from Ghosts) automatically becoming Evil upon being raised, I was reminded of Arazni's lore where it seems that she needed further convincing to fully convert over to embracing Evil, so I just wanted to pick your brain on the matter to see if you thought the Raising itself were something that altered the character's perception of reality instantly or if it's just one of those things where a formerly Good-aligned undead thinks at first they can still be Good but then inherently darker desires as an undead eventually unleash themselves, I suppose in a manner similar to a slow-acting alignment-shifting curse.
Also, as a related but ultimately separate question I may as well ask what the exact implications are, spiritually speaking, that one can even raise Outsiders as undead given that their body IS their soul. I'm well aware of the fact that raising a mortal as an undead prevents them from facing Judgement by Pharasma and janks with the Cycle of Souls, but my friends and I have tried looking it up and we aren't quite sure what exactly happens to Outsiders when THEY die, since I'm pretty sure Pathfinder doesn't use the lore stating that killing Outsiders doesn't really "kill" them unless you do it on their home plane. Anyway, yeah, Lord help me if I can't find an answer to how this works in Pathfinder's lore anywhere in books or in any Q/A's, IS there an official answer to this, and if so did me and my buddies just miss it somewhere? Does raising an Outsider actually interact with the cycle at all?
These forums truncate long wall-of-text posts when you try to quote them, and that makes it difficult to address questions. It also makes it difficult to address questions when they're buried in text. In the future, for this thread, please keep the posts short and sweet to one question per post—I don't want to get into a back-and-forth debate or discussion about answers here, since I don't have the time to do so and still be able to answer other folks' questions here as well.
When an outsider dies, its body and soul decay into quintessence and is recycled into the fundamental building blocks of the outer planes. Check out Planar Adventures, pages 64–69 for more info. (Page 68, middle of the first column, specifically addresses how outsider death works).
Pathfinder ABSOLUTELY uses the lore that an outsider slain is dead, regardless of if it was on its home plane. That element is a D&D-ism that we didn't retain for Pathfinder. A summoned creature isn't really a real creature—it's just a manifestation of an ideal, and as such when they're slain they just dissipate, regardless of the plane it's on.
In any event, as long as there are remains to animate of a dead outsider, it can be animated or become undead. In fact, some undead in the game ONLY come about from dead outsiders. Nightshades, for example.
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What did you think of the Dragon Prince Netflix series? It is made by the people who made Avatar the Last Airbender.
Never heard of it, so I don't think anything about it. I've seen a few episodes of Avatar, and appreciated it, but it's not really for me. I prefer to spend my time watching other things.
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Hi!
I was thinking about running a solo game of Council of Thieves with PF1 rules.
I am "new" to PF, what type of books should I use, if I am considering using an all good aligned, "divine focused" characters (paladin, cleric, divine sorcerer, monk hunter with a spiritual beast)?
Should I use the core rulebook only?
Should I use the Ultimate Campaign or other similar sourcebooks (I am not familiar with any of them)?
If you're new to Pathfinder, I suggest you limit the number of books. Stick to the core rules and the Bestiary and the content in Council of Thieves, in order to keep things manageable. You're already going to be running the game in a complex way that the rules weren't really designed to handle (solo play), so complicating things beyond using the core rules would make it increasingly difficult.
For solo games, you have to be particularly wary of monsters that use abilities that temporarily disable a PC. Things like paralysis, stun, entangle, confusion, etc. that take a character out of combat, even if only for a round, can swiftly turn into campaign-ending events since those effects assume that there are allies to help disabled PCs recover or at least protect them. If you don't want to remove these effects from the game, it's a good idea to have an NPC ally or two accompany the PC on their adventures, which puts a further load on the GM and makes it even more of a good idea to limit the books used for player options.
Finally, I'd chat on the boards elsewhere with GMs who've run games for solo characters, to get their feedback and advice.
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And it shouldn't be interpreted that these characters are of 21st level or higher, right?According to some pre-Mythic Adventures books, characters like Geb, Nex, Sorshen, Xanderghul and Xin were wizards with '20+' levels. Is that plus sign supposed to represent archmage tiers now?It represents the fact that there's more to the character than 20 levels and a PC class. Some of them have mythic tiers. Some have templates. Some have ad-hoc unique bonuses that PCs can't get. Point is, it means that their CR is higher than 20 for whatever reason.
That's not a thing in Pathfinder. 20th level is the cap.
If we/you want a creature/NPC to be more powerful than 20th level gives them, you have to give them racial hit dice, templates, mythic abilities, or just make stuff up for them; when you do so use the monster building guidelines in the Bestiary as benchmarks.
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Which of the Queens of the Night would be most receptive to be a patron for a witch?
Patrons aren't creatures. They're areas of focus or study. Magical specializations, if you will.
If a witch wants to serve/worship a deity or demigod, her alignment and personality dictate what would be an appropriate religion, not her patron.
And it shouldn't be interpreted that these characters are of 21st level or higher, right?According to some pre-Mythic Adventures books, characters like Geb, Nex, Sorshen, Xanderghul and Xin were wizards with '20+' levels. Is that plus sign supposed to represent archmage tiers now?It represents the fact that there's more to the character than 20 levels and a PC class. Some of them have mythic tiers. Some have templates. Some have ad-hoc unique bonuses that PCs can't get. Point is, it means that their CR is higher than 20 for whatever reason.That's not a thing in Pathfinder. 20th level is the cap.
If we/you want a creature/NPC to be more powerful than 20th level gives them, you have to give them racial hit dice, templates, mythic abilities, or just make stuff up for them; when you do so use the monster building guidelines in the Bestiary as benchmarks.
I see that's not a thing in Pathfinder. But is that a thing in Second Edition? I really wish Second Edition has both epic levels and mythic tiers.
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I see that's not a thing in Pathfinder. But is that a thing in Second Edition? I really wish Second Edition has both epic levels and mythic tiers.
I'm not answering things about 2nd Edition here yet.
And I won't be until the new edition of the game is out. We're still playtesting the game and gathering feedback (and if you have specific feedback you want us to hear, you ABSOLUTELY should be posting to the playtest forums, whether or not you're actually playing the playtest).
Are the crimelords of Riddleport on the wanted list in other Varisian cities? For example, let's presume Gaston Cromarcky, the overlord of Riddleport, suddenly became tired of the life as a crimelord and decided to retire. He successfully and peacefully transfered the overlordship of Riddleport to another crimelord(Elias Tammerhawk or Clegg Zincher would be a good candidate) and moved to another settlement like Magnimar, Korvosa, Sandpoint, or Galduria with his family to live a peaceful life. But he is a former pirate captain. So would the authorities of these settlements arrest and execute him for his past crimes?
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Are the crimelords of Riddleport on the wanted list in other Varisian cities? For example, let's presume Gaston Cromarcky, the overlord of Riddleport, suddenly became tired of the life as a crimelord and decided to retire. He successfully and peacefully transfered the overlordship of Riddleport to another crimelord(Elias Tammerhawk or Clegg Zincher would be a good candidate) and moved to another settlement like Magnimar, Korvosa, Sandpoint, or Galduria with his family to live a peaceful life. But he is a former pirate captain. So would the authorities of these settlements arrest and execute him for his past crimes?
Not officially, no.
Riddleport is its own city—there's not an overall Varisa government that would be able to prosecute/pursue justice against one of them. Doesn't mean some rich or powerful slighted NPC with a grudge wouldn't hire mercenaries or PCs to take a Riddleport crimelord to justice though, but that's more of a story-based thing than a "baked into the setting" thing.
